(The AFL-CIO circulated the following on February 14.)
DOCTORS, LAW WORKERS GO UNION—A unit of more than 230 doctors at Elmhurst Hospital Center in Queens, N.Y., affiliated their independent Attending Physicians Association with SEIU Local 10MD recently. Meanwhile, the majority of 34 clerical workers at the Prince George’s County (Md.) state attorney’s office voted to join SEIU Local 400 Jan. 28.
ILLINOIS WORKERS WIN VOICE—Thanks to an Illinois law unions fought hard to win, which allows public employees to form unions by majority sign-up, 63 Berwyn city workers have a voice on the job with AFSCME Council 31, as do 41 library technical assistants at Illinois State University in Normal. Under majority sign-up, the employer agrees to recognize the union as the workers’ bargaining agent when a majority signs authorization cards. Also, the 54 workers at Gateway Foundation Inc., a private, not-for-profit agency that provides substance abuse counseling services at Sheridan Correctional Center in Sheridan, voted to join AFSCME Council 31. In Wisconsin, 64 members of the formerly independent union De Pere Municipal Employment Association affiliated with AFSCME Council 40.
COLLEGE WORKERS CHOOSE AFT—Eighty secretarial, clerical, custodial and maintenance workers, as well as groundskeepers, at Owens Community College near Toledo, Ohio, voted to join the Ohio Federation of Teachers, an AFT affiliate, Feb. 8.
THOROUGHBRED WORKERS RIDE TO WIN—Some 19 drivers, dockworkers and dispatchers at Thoroughbred Express Inc. in London, Ky., voted to join Teamsters Local 651 recently. The company is a contractor that delivers packages for DHL, and the win is the latest in a series of victories for workers at DHL-contracted firms fighting to win a voice with IBT.
TELL CONGRESS: ‘TAKE THE PLEDGE’—Union activists can visit www.socialsecuritypledge.org, a new website, to tell their members of Congress to pledge to strengthen Social Security and oppose President George W. Bush’s efforts to privatize the nation’s most effective family protection program. Officials who sign the pledge say they will oppose Bush’s privatization proposals, which would require cuts in guaranteed benefits, weaken the system by diverting money to private accounts, increase the federal deficit and possibly increase the retirement age. Union activists also plan to meet with members of Congress in their home districts during congressional recesses and hold rallies and town hall meetings to make their voices heard.
FIRM QUITS PRIVATIZATION GROUP—Workers scored a victory in the campaign to strengthen Social Security Feb. 11 when broker Edward Jones pulled out of the Alliance for Worker Retirement Security, an industry group backing Social Security privatization. Edward Jones had been a member of the alliance since its inception in 1998. The pullout came after a coalition of community, retiree and union activists rallied Feb. 8 outside the firm’s St. Louis corporate headquarters while the firm’s executives were sending a national satellite broadcast on Social Security to clients in 9,000 offices nationwide. Activists also sent thousands of e-mails. The protestors and activists demanded Jones drop its support for Social Security privatization, which could earn billions for brokers but would hurt working families. In December, the firm paid a record $75 million to settle charges by the federal Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) that included accepting payments from mutual funds in exchange for steering clients to them. For more information, visit www.wallstreetgreed.org.
WEALTHY WIN, WORKERS LOSE IN BUDGET—President Bush’s $2.57 trillion federal budget submitted Feb. 7 makes massive funding cuts in health care, education, veterans and worker training programs. Overall, some 150 federal programs would be eliminated or drastically scaled back. One-third of those are education programs, including vocational education, anti-drug efforts and literacy programs. At the same time, the budget would make permanent the series of Bush tax cuts enacted since 2001 that primarily benefit the wealthy. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities estimates those tax cuts account for nearly half of the increase in budget deficits since 2001. “The proposed budget slashes programs that help workers build futures for their children and prepare themselves for changes in the workplace,” said AFL-CIO President John Sweeney. The Bush budget cuts Medicaid, the federal program that provides health care for low-income working families; veterans’ health care programs; job training and other programs established under the Workforce Investment Act to help jobless workers; and the Trade Adjustment Assistance program that provides assistance to workers whose jobs are shipped overseas. Other cuts are aimed at the Healthy Communities Access Program, rural health care grants, the Community Food and Nutrition Program and Migrant and Seasonal Farmworkers Program. For the AFL-CIO analysis of the Bush budget proposals, visit www.aflcio.org/bushwatch.
BUSH TARGETS DEFENSE WORKERS—The Bush administration has proposed personnel rules for more than 700,000 Department of Defense workers that gut the civil service and bargaining rights of the department’s civilian workers. The new rules mean “that [the Defense Department] will soon get the opportunity to treat their employees as if they were second-class citizens,” said AFGE President John Gage. Under the rules, workers no longer would have the right to negotiate work assignments, work methods or how new technology is used. The rules are slated for publication in the “Federal Register” Feb. 14, which begins a 30-day public comment period. Submit your comments online at www.regulations.gov. In January, a similar set of personnel rules was announced for 170,000 workers in the Department of Homeland Security, and Bush administration officials say they will seek to impose similar new personnel rules on the entire federal workforce. For more information, visit www.afge.org and www.aflcio.org.
WAL-MART HIT WITH CHILD-LABOR VIOLATION—After receiving kid-glove treatment from the Department of Labor, Wal-Mart will pay a $135,540 fine for violating U.S. child labor laws. According to the charges, teenagers used hazardous equipment at stores in Arkansas, Connecticut and New Hampshire, including a chain saw, paper balers and forklifts. In January, the Labor Department signed an agreement with Wal-Mart promising to give the mammoth company advance notice before investigating any allegations of wage and hour violations. Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.) called for the department’s inspector general to review the agreement.
WAL-MART CLOSES UNION STORE—In Canada, Wal-Mart announced Feb. 9 it will close its first unionized store rather than submit to binding arbitration with United Food and Commercial Workers Canada Local 503, which has represented nearly 200 Wal-Mart workers in Jonquière, Quebec, since last fall. UFCW President Joseph Hansen said, “This latest action by Wal-Mart demonstrates, once again, the company’s systematic abuse of working families.” To sign a petition telling Wal-Mart CEO Lee Scott to keep the Jonquière store open and respect workers, visit www.ufcw.org.
VOTE HURTS WAGE, CIVIL RIGHTS SUITS—The U.S. Senate defeated an amendment to class-action lawsuit legislation that would have kept civil rights and wage and hour claims—such as overtime pay disputes—in state courts rather than forcing them into overburdened federal courts that often are reluctant to review such cases. The Bush administration is seeking limits on class-action lawsuits that are often the only legal avenue ordinary working people have to press claims against corporate lawbreakers.
AMTRAK: TROUBLE AHEAD—The 22,000 workers at Amtrak, the nation’s passenger rail line, are living “under a cloud of fear and uncertainty as the survival of Amtrak and their jobs is questioned,” because President Bush’s budget (see box) eliminates all federal funding for the railroad, said Edward Wytkind, president of the AFL-CIO Transportation Trades Department. Last year Congress approved $1.2 billion for Amtrak. The Bush administration wants to privatize the railroad by forcing into bankruptcy and selling its most profitable parts, transportation advocates said. “They have no plan for Amtrak other than bankruptcy,” wrote Amtrak President David Gunn in a letter to employees. He called Bush’s action “irresponsible and a surprising disappointment.”
SETTING THE STANDARD—A new multimillion-dollar development near Milwaukee will meet county wage and labor standards after the Milwaukee County Board of Supervisors voted Feb. 3 to override the county executive’s veto of the board-passed standards. A strong coalition of more than 35 union, religious and community groups lobbied for the standards, which include hiring racial minorities, paying the prevailing wage and assuring affordable housing and protection of parkland and open space in the reconstruction.
PAVING THE WAY—In Western Pennsylvania, some 15,000 highway construction workers won a new three-year contract that improves wages and benefits. The workers are members of five unions—Operating Engineers, IBT, Laborers, Plasters and Cement Masons and the unaffiliated Carpenters—which negotiated with the Constructors Association of Western Pennsylvania.
RECORD TRADE DEFICIT AGAIN—For the third consecutive year, the U.S. trade deficit set a record, the Commerce Department announced Feb. 10. The 2004 deficit of $617.7 billion dwarfs the record $496.5 billion set in 2003. The U.S. deficit with China, the largest with any country, reached unprecedented heights at $162 billion, eclipsing the record $124 billion deficit with that country in 2003.
SEC SHIELDS HALLIBURTON—Contrary to what it previously promised investors, the SEC ruled Feb. 7 that executives of scandal-plagued Halliburton Co. can exclude a shareholder proposal from the AFSCME Pension Fund and the Connecticut Retirement Plans and Trust Funds. The proposal asks the company to allow investors to nominate their own candidates to the company’s board of directors. Vice President Dick Cheney served as Halliburton CEO from 1995 to August 2000, when Bush chose him as his vice presidential running mate. “It has been clear for quite some time that Halliburton enjoys special protection in George Bush’s Washington….We hope this is a passing case of political influence and not a signal that the commission can no longer be trusted to act as the investors advocate,” said AFL-CIO President John Sweeney.
DELIGHT AT SKYLIGHT—American Federation of Musicians of the United States and Canada Local 8 members at Skylight Opera Theatre in Milwaukee unanimously ratified a first contract that raises performance and rehearsal pay. The three-year contract improves job security and designates 25 musicians as nonprobationary, which gives them the right of first refusal for pit jobs. It adds a grievance and arbitration procedure. Skylight, which employs one to 20 musicians for about 30 rehearsals and 80 performances each year, agreed not to use recordings or other devices to replace the orchestra.